Black Hawk statue restoration leader undaunted by cancer diagnosis

Charron Rausa and her husband, Frank, are nearing completion of their improbable campaign to restore an iconic statue, the 48-foot, 270-ton Eternal Indian that draws about 400,000 visitors a year to bluffs along the Rock River in Oregon, Ill.

They've raised 90 percent of the money needed to renovate the structure, which is in Lowden State Park about 100 miles west of Chicago. An experienced, highly regarded conservator has been hired. A crew has sheathed the statue in mesh and scaffolding to protect it from the elements until work can start in the spring.

Having achieved all that from an idea hatched at their kitchen table in 2008, the septuagenarians now face a grimmer, more formidable challenge. Charron Rausa was diagnosed last month with stage 4 lung cancer. The disease has spread through her body.

She and her husband have decided against asking doctors for details on her prognosis or how long she may have to live. The Rausas simply have made up their minds that Charron is going to see the new statue's unveiling, which is set tentatively for late 2015.

"When I shook my finger at the doctor, he looked a little shocked," Charron Rausa, 79, recalled of the day she got her diagnosis.

She laughed, something she does often, and recalled telling the doctor she needed to finish her treatments and be well by the fall, "because I've got some place to be. I've worked too hard on him (the statue) not to be there."

The hard work started in their home in Sterling. After reading a local newspaper story about the loss of state funding to restore the statue, Charron Rausa turned to her husband and said, "Frank, the American people fixed the Statue of Liberty. Now, doggone it, we need to fix the Black Hawk statue."

The 103-year-old cultural and historic touchstone, designed by acclaimed sculptor Lorado Taft, acquired the Black Hawk name as a reference to the martyred Native American who led his people during the Black Hawk War of 1832 in the region. It looks nothing like Black Hawk the man, however.

And, different historical sources claim the statue's face is based on a composite of Native American men or one of Taft's close friends, writer Hamlin Garland, who lived at an art colony that occupied the area before it became a state park.

After reading that newspaper story, the Rausas got to work almost immediately. Frank Rausa, 72, wrote a grant to obtain funding, but that was rejected. The Rausas established a nonprofit, Friends of the Black Hawk Statue Committee, and were able to place the statue on the National Register of Historic Places.

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Black Hawk statue restoration leader undaunted by cancer diagnosis